


A Question Of Coffee

by Jenwryn



Series: The Meg AU [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, Humor, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-16
Updated: 2007-03-16
Packaged: 2017-10-02 06:33:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenwryn/pseuds/Jenwryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rodney bets he can go fifteen days without caffeine. She bets she can go fifteen days without talking. Naturally, the whole of Atlantis takes sides.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Question Of Coffee

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I'll admit it - I do have a bit of a thing for McKay when he's cranky! ♥
> 
> Unbeta'd.

To say that Doctor Rodney McKay was furious would have been an understatement. He was enraged. He was incensed. He was frothing at the mouth. He was so worked up that for a moment he couldn't even speak. He just stood there with his finger pointed in Meaghan's direction.

In her defence, at least this time it hadn't been her fault. Well, not strictly speaking anyway. He hadn't actually said that she ought keep an eye on the coffee machine and it was ridiculous that it needed minding in the first place. Besides, it wasn't as though Meaghan actually drank the stuff – corroded your insides, coffee did, or God knows what. Furthermore, she hadn’t even been _in _the lab when it had happened. Instead, she’d been sitting on the windowsill inside the room where Teyla taught stick-fighting, and she’d eaten a gherkin sandwich and greatly delighted in watching Ronon fight against one of the marines and _perhaps _she’d indulged in just a little bit of mental undressing too. Nothing wrong with that, she was a healthy, red-blooded woman and, well, just look at the man, dammit! She had no intention of purchasing, sure, but she wouldn’t have said no to a test-drive…

And now McKay stood there, pointing his finger ever-so-stupidly at her where she sat, minding her own business, at her desk.

She shook her head up at him. ‘It’s not _my _fault your stupid machine exploded or imploded or whatever the hell it did. Get someone else to babysit it next time. I have better things to do. You seem under the impression that you’re the only one around here with letters after your name but, you know, I have a few too. And, besides, I thought you’d decided to pretend that I’m wasn’t here – it’s not like I _chose _to work in your lab. Trust me, I’ll be gone just as soon as the plumbers have stopped fiddling with mine.’

Finally she had been given her own workspace – although, seeing as how her slight promotion had involved her taking over forensics work, part-time, in the morgue, she still wasn’t entirely convinced that it had been a good call.

McKay finally found his tongue. 'Well, _Doctor _Monahan, the next time they make perving on Ronon a job requirement, please let me know and I'll change departments.'

She blinked. Firstly, she hadn't known that “perve” was even in McKay's vocabulary and, secondly, she hadn't realised that he knew where she spent her lunch breaks. She floundered for a comeback.

He took her silence as an affirmation and nodded triumphantly. 'Exactly. And while you were off salivating―'

She broke in before he got onto a roll. 'Oi, it’s still not my fault. The bloody thing would have kicked the bucket whether I were here or not. Get over it already. Maybe if you didn't drink so much coffee, you wouldn't be so strung out all the time. Have you tried _sleeping_ like a normal human being does? I bet you couldn't last two days without a caffeine fix!'

'And I bet you couldn't last two minutes without opening your mouth to talk! If you tried using it less and thinking more, you might find the world works better.'

Meaghan glared at him furiously and then, at that moment, oh dear, was hit by a sudden beam of only slightly mad inspiration. Her glare smoothed itself out into a somewhat conniving smile. ‘Is that a genuine bet, McKay?’

It was his turn to blink.

Her smiled broadened. 'Seriously. You know, the _Daedalus _forms circulate in fifteen days. And as Head of the Science Department, they grant you a certain amount of space for yourself, which you can request that they fill with whatever you want.'

'Only one box,' he protested, astonished to realise that everyone else knew. Although, actually, they didn’t: Meaghan was just a shrewd bluffer.

'Besides,' he protested, as though he had to provide a justification or an excuse for his privileges. 'I only use it for important things.'

She wrinkled her nose in amusement. 'You mean your _Star Trek _magazines.'

He blinked again.

This time it wasn't a bluff. She'd been rifling through his desk drawers. Very educational.

McKay went slightly pink.

Meaghan rose a little on her chair and looked at him intensely. 'I bet that you can't go the fifteen days until the forms are handed out without caffeine. And I bet that I _can _go those fifteen days without opening my mouth and talking. If you fail, I get that box space to use for what I want―' Her face assumed a slightly dreamy expression. '_Real _tea. English Breakfast, Earl Grey, Darjeeling, rosehip, peppermint, camomile…’

His eyes narrowed. 'And if you fail?' It was obvious that he believed she would.

She smiled serenely. 'Then you can have my chocolate stash. My brother gave me a whole shoebox full the last time I saw him, but I've been on the diet from hell – with Ingrid helping me, so you know I mean it – and so it’s pretty much all still there. And I’m talking proper chocolate here, McKay. Belgian, Swiss, and a few bars of Whittakers, New Zealand’s finest, my God. Not your cheap imitation crap.’

His eyes gleamed and he actually licked his lips. Then he asked, somewhat sullen at the mere suggestion, 'And if neither of us fail?'

She shrugged. 'Highly unlikely. But in that case... I get half your box space on the _Daedalus_ and you get half my chocolate. Deal?'

'Deal,' he agreed, and they shook hands on it like a pair of kids in the school ground. Then he looked puzzled as she turned to the computer and started rapidly typing. 'What are you doing?' he asked.

She opened her mouth to answer him, grinned, and clamped it shut again. Pulling a stack of post-its from one of her pockets, she scrawled a quick note for him and then went back to her typing. She was writing an open email on the internal mailing system, to everyone on Atlantis, telling them all about the bet they'd made. There was no way she wanted to give McKay any opportunity to become a closet-caffeine-absorber. And, besides – she figured it was only fair to explain why she was about to get very, very silent…

*****

Within minutes of McKay leaving her side, Meaghan had made some rapid changes to her plans for the next fifteen days. Firstly, she cancelled the briefing she'd had scheduled with Doctor Weir about her latest project, promising a comprehensive report instead, to be delivered within two days, and an explanation as to why. The report would be a swine to write, but at least Elizabeth's response had been amused rather than annoyed. Then Meaghan had sent an email to the IT nerds (she'd been cultivating their friendship carefully with chocolate cookies, since she sucked at tech so badly) and asked that they divert all messages for her radio to McKay's instead – except in a real emergency of course. At first they'd refused, but when she'd promised one of the blokes she'd try and organise a date for him with Nomusa-who-works-in-the-mess-hall he'd suddenly changed his tune. Meaghan was relieved –it would save her from answering out of habit... and also irritate the hell out of McKay. Finally, she'd sent a message to her best friend Ingrid, who worked in the infirmary, and asked her to meet her for dinner.

By seven p.m., when she was navigating her way through the mess hall with a tray of food in her hands to where her dark-haired German friend was sitting, it seemed as though the entire city had heard about her bet with McKay. And, from the waves and winks, a good percentage of them appeared to be barracking for her. She knew that her early run-ins with the scientist had earnt her some sympathy votes – that and the fact that he made a habit of irritating people. So she grinned and waved back merrily, almost tipping the food from her tray onto the floor as she went. The more willing people were to help her, the easier her part of the bet would be. She grinned to herself and made a mental note to find out from Zelenka how the bookie rings were viewing it.

Ingrid, always quick to the point, greeted her with a wry grin and said, '_Scheiβe_, girl. You have no problem with making people talk, do you?'

Meaghan grinned, put her tray down, and sat in the seat across from her friend. Then she raised her hands into sight and began the rapid, complex dance that was sign language. Not Auslan, which was used back home, but ASL, which she'd learnt when she'd had a Yank boyfriend with a hearing-impaired sister and, thankfully, which was the type that Ingrid knew too.

Ingrid's grin broadened. She put down the glass she'd been holding and laughed. 'Of course I'll help. But doesn't sign language count as talking?'

Meaghan's fingers danced cheerfully, explaining that the conditions were that she didn't _open her mouth and talk._ Well, her mouth was firmly clamped shut, so she wasn't breaking any rules. It wasn't her fault that McKay hadn't been more specific. After all, _she'd_ been quite clear about what he had to do. She grinned and showed her friend the sign she had created to represent McKay, rather than spell-signing his whole name each time. Ingrid laughed so hard that people turned and stared – an opportunity that Meaghan decided to make use of. Jumping onto her chair, she put her arms up and her hands flitted conversationally. Two women and one man stood up, somewhat cautiously, in response. Fine, so not as many people in Atlantis spoke ASL.as she'd expected. She tried Auslan. No takers at all. Bummer, so it wouldn't be as useful as she'd hoped. But still, the man she recognised as being from the Control Tower team, which could come in handy.

She was still standing on her chair, explaining to the three ASL speakers that they'd be more than welcome to be translators for her if they fancied it, and everyone in the mess-hall grinning at her as they realised what she was up to, when McKay walked in. He was already in a foul mood and seriously regretting the bet he had made and to say that his blood rose at the sight of her standing there on her chair, mouth firmly shut and hands talking ten-to-the-dozen, would be a slight understatement.

He rushed over to her table and yelled up at her, 'That's cheating! You can't do that! That's talking!' He glared around him rabidly at the amused room. 'She can't do that!'

Meaghan pointed firmly at her mouth, and then glanced pointedly at Ingrid. The nurse, who McKay had publicly humiliated just two days beforehand, grinned wickedly and translated, 'Megs says that your terms were clear and she has her mouth shut. You never said anything about sign language. Just, no mouth-open-talking. If she were a ventriloquist, that would work too. She, on the other hand, was dead specific. No caffeine. The best you can do is sniff it.'

Positively raging, McKay stomped back out of the mess hall and the two girls collapsed into laughter.

*

The next day, Weir sat at her desk and looked at McKay with an eyebrow raised in amusement and a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. 'I fail to see what it has to do with me, Rodney. I can't help it if you didn't think before you agreed on this bet. You could always concede defeat.'

He had his hands bunched at his sides. 'But it's not fair! She's swanning around talking sign language with her friend, and everybody helping her, and having a grand old time! How was I to know that she speaks it? How was I to know that half the city speaks it!?'

Elizabeth thought that was a rather enormous exaggeration (it was no where _near _half), although she tossed up making a comment to him with her own fluent fingers, but restrained herself and said calmly instead, 'A large percentage of the government positions that the civilians here had before they came to Atlantis tended to look favourably on people who took the time and effort to learn to sign. And, while I know she's good at languages, I seriously doubt that Doctor Monahan can speak more than a maximum of two types. You do know that they _are _very geographically different, Rodney.'

He was ropable. 'Well, can't you _order_ her to talk? Surely it's against regulations to refuse to talk? What if – what if the city were on fire or – or – oh, I don't know, what if the Wraith turned up?' He was getting desperate.

Elizabeth's eyes sparkled. 'I'm sure that under those circumstances, she _would _talk, Rodney. I doubt even Doctor Monahan is that stubborn. And as for demanding her to, well, it hasn't negatively affected her job so far as I've seen. If anything, she seems to have worked harder in the last twenty-four hours ever before, no doubt due to all the chatting that normally eats up her time.' Elizabeth laughed despite herself. 'I might have to order her to stay stumm, come to think of it.'

McKay's hands twitched, and he stomped out of Elizabeth’s office. Everyone was on that upstart of a little weasel's side. And if he had to go another day without coffee... He twitched again. They were all watching him, making sure he couldn't sneak a drink, or something. And that hideous friend of hers had everyone in the infirmary on her side, including Carson, and nobody would give him anything to ease his pain. The irritating Scot had even had the hide to suggest that it might do Rodney the world of good, though he “didn't normally advocate going cold turkey.” Rodney had had to squeeze his fingers deep into his pockets to stop himself from punching his friend's grinning face at that point. He couldn't take this much longer. If he had to put up with another day of John slacking in front of him and drinking coffee right beneath his nose... They all thought it was so funny. God, Monahan herself, damn her, though she didn't actually drink the stuff, had taken up carrying mugs of it around with her. She'd sit there at her desk in his lab, with the sweet smell of coffee wafting around her, and just grin at him.

He was going to go mad, and she thought she was so damn funny.

He stopped dead in the hall.

Two could play at that game.

He'd just _make _her talk!

*

To suggest that McKay's judgment had been slightly damaged by his caffeine-withdrawal would be putting it mildly. On the other hand, to suggest it _to his face_ would have been suicide. He had tried de-caf, since she hadn't actually forbidden coffee itself, but it just didn't work the same. Of course, anyone could have explained to him that this was all in his head - rather like the placebos Carson had tried out on him once - but nobody was stupid enough to try. He stalked around the city as foul-tempered as an asgard with sunburn. He had almost completely given up on actual work, and when he wasn't stalking, he sat staring at his screen saver and thinking about ways to make that damned woman speak... which, if he had been in a better frame of mind, even he must surely have recognised as one of the greatest ironies of his life. After all, up till he'd embarked on this bet, he had usually been wishing she came with a mute button.

Still, it wasn't as though Meaghan was coping as well as he seemed to believe. She had taken up chewing her fingernails (or rather, the skin along the edge of them), an evil habit she thought she had kicked in her undergrad days. To make matters worse, she'd been eating enough food to make Ronon's calorie intake look subdued. It was as though her mouth was missing its customary exercise and was trying to find substitutes. And of course, excess eating made her cross, and being cross made her eat to excess - all of which combined into a nasty little circular process that had left her with a horrid bunch of pimples on her chin, and a mood about as rotten as McKay's. It was just that she hid it a little better than he did. But it meant that when the first onslaught in Rodney's war-to-make-her-speak came, she was hardly wound up to view it with amusement.

The first attempt had been the leeches. Perhaps it wasn't very original, but on the other hand it had come to him at 3am in the morning whilst he was staring at the ceiling from his bed and rapping his feet against the wall (to the supreme irritation of his neighbour). He'd 'borrowed' a small jar of the revolting little creatures from the entomologists down the hall - he wasn't sure what they had wanted them for, but they were leeches for crying out loud so it could hardly be earth-shatteringly important. Then he'd shaken them into her tote bag when she was at her lunch break, and made himself scarce. He'd heard the shriek from two rooms away, but though when he'd arrived on the scene she'd been standing there, a look of utter horror on her face, and peering wildly down the front of her t-shirt regardless of the small crowd that had gathered, not a word had left her mouth. Probably only the fact that she'd shrieked rather than sworn had saved her, but Rodney wasn't to have known that she would do that.

The problem was, that despite possessing an impressive intellect, this type of thing was a little outside his area of expertise. His first thought had been to ask John, but the smirking Colonel had simply shrugged and explained that he had placed a bet on the girl hacking it out longer than McKay and so, he explained with a long, deep, almost _indecent_ mouthful of coffee, 'It would hardly make sense for me to help you, would it?' To McKay's horror, it appeared that most of the people he knew were in fact betting against him. And Zelenka was no use at all, he'd just smiled and said that as prime bookie, he had to stay neutral. Ronon had actually offered _his_ help, but McKay wasn't sunk deep enough yet to admit that Conon-the-barbarian might know more about something than he did. So he'd just stomped off proudly. And then spent the night staring at his ceiling again. It made no sense that he couldn't sleep. He had never been more exhausted in his life, but the thudding headache eating at his skull from the inside was more than he could bear.

The next day he'd fashioned the ink-bomb. It had finally occurred to him during his insomnia that her fright might have saved her, and he'd decided to focus on feeding her anger instead. After all, he'd seen her when she was mad - all too often, in fact - and he knew that she normally started any form of enraged outburst with a string of multi-lingual and inordinately explicit swear words. He'd waited until she was in her casual clothes before he attacked, and though he didn't know it, the prank-gods were smiling in his favour because she happened to have on her favourite t-shirt, a pale green one her brother had given her, with the words '_music will provide the light you cannot resist'_ on the front in big yellow letters. He'd shot the small projectile straight at her, and she'd jumped, then glanced down, outrage in her eyes. Her mouth had opened, but instead of speaking she'd made a slightly strangled sound and then bit down hard on her knuckles while her other hand slammed out in a punch against the wall. Unfortunately for McKay, none of that qualified as talking. But even more unfortunately, she had seen him watching her with his smug grin, and put two and two together. Her blood boiled.

It was the t-shirt event that turned the female inhabitants of Atlantis into firm Meaghan supporters. They hadn't all been, at the start. She could be loud-mouthed and opinionated, and dressed like a dag, and those things don't always make a girl friends amongst other girls. But to have your favourite item of clothing so maliciously destroyed...

If Rodney McKay had already declared war, well, now Meaghan Monahan was an official combatant.

*

 

Meaghan, however, had a problem. It occurred to her the next day, when she woke up to have a shower and found it not just so cold that a polar bear would turn his nose up at it, but also smelling faintly of dish-water. You see, there was a rather enormous hole in her cleverly thought out plans.

The hole was the time frame. In the scheme things, fifteen days is quite long.

And while there is no reason why you should find it any easier to not-talk at the end of fifteen days than you did at the start (unless you really get into the whole Zen aspect of it... which didn't necessarily mesh so with Meaghan's personality!) there are however a host of reasons why you will find it easier and easier to deal with a caffeine-free life as time progresses. Quite simply, McKay was getting over it.

Sure, he wasn't about to do a Leonardo DiCaprio and declare himself king of the world from a balcony any time soon - though come to think of it, that would be more down Sheppard's line - but he had suddenly woken up after a grand night's sleep and realised that he had been going about the whole thing in a really childish way. Was he, or was he not, the smartest man on the face of the planet? He blinked at the thought. And with that bolt of inspiration bursting though his marvellously renewed clear-thinking mind, he had jumped from bed eagerly for the first time in days, and set to work.

All of Team-Meaghan's previous ploys, effective as they had been, simply ceased to work overnight. Cleverly positioned coffee earned nothing more than a depreciating glance, and lasciviously drinking it front of him just got looked down on with a shake of the head. And the women of the city who had been successfully annoying the living daylights out of him for days suddenly found that he was perfectly capable of ignoring them without exception.

It was, in Meaghan's eyes, a complete and utter disaster. He was, she realised, going to coast through the last few days of their bet without even so much as a whimper, let alone a cold sweat or a twitch. The realisation disturbed her to the bone - but it wasn't as though she had time to worry about it.

Because with the return of McKay's judgement there came also the return of his creative nastiness, and he plunged her mercilessly into a dark form of techno-hell.

The city's inhabitants watched, shook their heads, and the books changed to McKay's favour.

The first had been the shower. She had a deep and dark suspicion that he had somehow managed to re-route the stuff from the kitchen-sinks. Still, she could deal with that - so long as nobody told her mother about her new hygiene regime (or lack of it) - as she started wrapping her hair in a scarf instead of washing it. Wherever she walked there wafted a heavy scent of vanilla body spray.

Then it was the lights. No matter what she did, they simply would _not_ work. Until 2am in the morning, that is, when they all came on and glared down at her like something from a B-grade alien flick, forcing her to sleep with a pillow over her head.

She had tried moving in with Ingrid, but was kicked out after just one night because her quarters went as odd as Meaghan's... and while friendship might be forever, it doesn't include dish-water showers and sleeping in a solarium.

But it was the doors that almost broke her. It didn't matter where she was going, somehow the doors knew she had arrived and they would shut fast and force her to walk at least a good fifteen minutes extra to get wherever it was that she wanted to be. Of course, it didn't just infuriate her, it also infuriated all the other people who had to wait until she and her cloud of vanilla were out of sight before the doors would sigh back into obedience. She realised that he had her in a corner the morning that she had been stupid enough to actually try and use a transporters - and then sat on the floor for an hour until it decided to work again. Of course, she could have used her radio to get it fixed quicker. But when it came to stubbornness, she was as bad as McKay himself.

It was when people heard about the transporter event that the books started to shift again - that they would both succeed. Naturally, everyone thought that was a bit boring and they both discovered themselves suddenly under attack from all directions as people picked their favourite (or the person they had the most money on). Which left Meaghan with nothing more to do than suck down copious quantities of caffeine-rich fasting tea, in a vague attempt to shed the kilos she'd packed on, and stare in disbelief at how the bet was ending. Quite simply, he'd stopped caring about not having caffeine. And she'd taken up the habit. God, what a world.

But then, when twelve days had passed and it seemed to have come to a kind of Mexican stand-off, Doctor Weir appeared in the lab that they were still sharing. 'Right,' she said with a determined look on her face, and then threw a pile of papers onto Meaghan's desk. 'I am hereby declaring a 24 hour cease-fire.'

They both blinked at her in surprise, and she quirked up an eyebrow, 'I don't see what other choice I have. Frankly you're the most stubborn pair of people I have ever met. But the fact is, I have an IOC delegation arriving on the _Daedalus _this afternoon, and tomorrow morning they are expecting an _oral _report by Doctor Monahan. Or had you forgotten that the _Daedalus _was coming? Isn't that what started this whole thing? Quite simply, I need her voice. Now, since I don't think it would be sporting to force her to loose, I'm suspending your bet until - ' she glanced at her watch, 'Fourteen hundred tomorrow. Until then, McKay can have as much caffeine as he wants, and the good doctor can talk her head off, God help us all. Now shake on it!'

Grudgingly they stood, looked at each other slightly suspiciously, then clasped hands. Meaghan breathed a sigh of relief and cleared her voice to speak - and then stared in the utmost amazement and delight as McKay walked straight to his coffee machine and poured himself a cup. She couldn't believe it. All the cold-turkey he had gone through - and just a few days left - and he couldn't wait that long? So much for a genius! She almost rubbed her hands together in pleasure. Well, if he really wanted to start over again...

A wicked grin lit up her face and she swung her sneakers onto her desk, leant her chair back, and then started reading aloud the report that Doctor Weir expected her to give.

*

 

The sight of McKay swilling down more coffee than even _he _would normally consume over a week set the books turning so fast that Zelenka was forced to hire an assistant. After all, everyone else in the city could remember all too well just how hard he had found de-caffinating himself (if that's even a word) the first time around. They were doubtful that he could pull it off a twice, and were also peeved that he was inflicting it on them yet again. Carson had been so distressed at the sight that he'd almost had tears in his eyes when he confronted the physicist. 'But Rodney,' he said pleadingly, 'You were making such progress. I'd started to hope that you might stay on a path of moderation even after this bet was over.'

McKay had stared at him, 'You _are_ kidding, right?'

The Scotsman shook his head, then lowered his voice, narrowed his eyes and said, 'Look, I've got two bottles of fine malt whiskey riding on you, man, and if you don't make it through the whole fifteen days...' He made a menacing motion that seemed to threaten great pain and large needles. But McKay had just shrugged, and taken another gulp of coffee, 'I did it once, I can do it again. And it's only two days this time.'

Famous last words.

At fourteen-hundred on the dot, Meaghan's watch had let out a screech and she'd clamped her mouth shut. Considering she had been in the middle of a polite-but-awkward conversation with Woolsey about her experiences in the city so-far, it had been rather convenient timing. He had stared at her, dumbfounded, as she simply stopped in the middle of a sentence, pointed at her watch, then at her mouth, shrugged, and left it to a wryly amused Doctor Weir to try and explain to the confused man exactly what it was that he had just witnessed happening.

Meaghan herself had swanned off in delight to start torturing McKay. Of course, she wasn't all that successful at the start, because it took a few hours for his caffeine-overdose-induced euphoria to wear off.

But by 5:30 am the next morning, when she found him hunched in the mess hall with a untouched glass of apple juice, and his head buried in his arms, she guessed he was starting to regret his rash actions. And it was possible, if the strangled little groans he let slip occasionally were anything to go by, he was also starting to remember just how hateful it had been. She perched on the edge of his table with a merry chuckle, a bottle of her fasting-tea in one hand and a piece of toast dripping with butter and honey in the other (yes - the finer logic of the purpose _behind_ fasting tea had somewhat escaped her - actually, if truth be told, she'd just gotten hooked on the caffeine, though she’d never have admitted it to Rodney).

He glared at her.

She swung her boots cheerfully and he glared at them too. Although she had on the tan slacks and blue top of a civilian scientist, her boots were an unorthodox shade of shiny yellow that wasn't just against the regulations, but was also offensively jolly.

'I don't see why someone hasn't had you in front of the uniform police yet,' he muttered, and then peered up at her bleary-eyed. She was wearing a badge that Ingrid had made her, which simply said - very originally of course - _Ha Ha Rodney._ He glared at that too, then buried his head back in his arms and hoped vainly that she would go away. Depressingly, he had the sneaking suspicion somewhere down in the foggy depths of his mind, that today was her day off.

He was _sooo_ right.

She poked him on the shoulder with a finger.

Nothing.

She poked him again.

Still nothing. Perhaps he'd fallen asleep... which considering she had roped his neighbours into having an awfully loud and awfully noisy party the night before, wouldn't have surprised her.

She leant forwards and tweaked a handful of hair at the base of his neck.

'God _damn _it!' he yelled, sprung up so fast he knocked his chair over, and stared at her with furious, slightly red eyes. She grinned, and thought _suck eggs, genius, that's revenge for the doors!_ She sprung lightly to her feet and tweaked his nose before scampering out of his range, _and that's revenge for the showers, dammit!_

He just stood and suddenly sagged slightly, hands loose at his sides. For a second - well, really only for some fraction of a second that she didn't know the technical term for - she almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

By then the mess hall was half full as people trickled in for breakfast... and _completely_ filled with the aroma of freshly made coffee. She waved at him chirpily and went to get herself another piece of toast.

He groaned, sat back down, and buried his head in his arms again.

A few minutes later John appeared and made his witty suggestion.

And it was proof that McKay's brain truly had regressed to pre-discovery-of-coffee-bean-primate stage, that he actually went through with it.

*

Meaghan stared from McKay to Sheppard - who she suspected was involved in this somehow - and felt the anger rise up inside her. She had been angry an awful lot in the last fourteen days, but this was truly the limit. She could feel the blood running to her cheeks and her pulse throbbed loudly in her ears and for a heartbeat she just stared at McKay. The mess hall had grown deathly silent around them. If she had spoken, not a soul would have missed it. But she didn't look like she was about to speak any time soon. Rodney slunk slightly back into his chair, as though he could vanish perhaps, and tried to laugh. _Damn Sheppard, damn caffeine, damn Meaghan. _It had been the Colonel's idea - he had completely forgotten that the man had his money on Meaghan. He'd been set up.

'Just joking,' he managed to say.

That was the last straw. She opened her mouth, shut it again, and then channelled all her accumulated fury into her fist and sent it swinging into Rodney's face. And actually, incredibly, broke his nose. Then, in the best version of a towering-fury that somebody her height could manage, she strode out of the mess hall leaving him in a blubbering, bloody mess in her wake. Nobody, _nobody_, told her she had a bum the size of a barn, at the top of his lungs, in public, and got away with it!

But _that_ was Meaghan's tactical error. Sure, his comment had re-cemented all the women onto her side. But her public humiliation of him had turned almost all the men into instant McKay fans. There is something about the sight of watching another man having the crap kicked out of him by a woman that deeply wounds the male psyche, and suddenly they were all at his side, offering advice.

It had been Ronon - Ronon, who he had refused to listen to right at the start - who had suggested the clincher. McKay had stared at him, wide-eyed, and still in slight pain from having his nose re-set by an unsympathetic Carson. He hadn't believed what he'd heard, and blinked, and said, 'Are you serious?'

He was a little more cautious now about accepting advice, but --

Ronon grinned. 'If _that_ doesn't make her talk, _nothing_ will.'****

*

Ronon's confidence had been efficiently transferred into Rodney. Overflowing with the certainty of his victory, the scientist strode through the halls towards the lab where Meaghan was working. He had left the room in a flurry of pride, grabbing a bottle on the way out and swilling it down as though it could provide him with a kind of Dutch courage - after all, he didn't have time to go via Zelenka's still, or the bar for that matter.

He stormed into the lab, bottle shoved wonkily in a pocket, and blithely ignored the curious looks coming at him from all sides. Then, without pausing to think, he grabbed her shoulders firmly with both hands, spun her round - and kissed her squarely on the mouth.

*

The lab positively buzzed with silence. Meaghan stared at Rodney in shock, then at the bottle in his pocket, then back at him, and _then_ \- to his indescribable astonishment - flung her arms around him and burst into laughter. 'You goose,' she managed to exclaim, then fell about him, clinging and laughing hysterically.

He grinned triumphantly for a moment, 'She spoke! You spoke!' Then he paused, 'So why are you laughing?'

She pulled away from him a little, wiped her eyes on her sleeve, and asked, 'Rodney, where did you get that bottle?'

He shrugged, glanced at his pocket, shrugged again, 'It's not coffee. It's not even _real_ tea. It's herbal.' He looked seriously disturbed by how this was going.

She shook her head, swallowed another laugh, and said, 'Yes, Rodney. But it's not _good_ herbal. It's my fasting tea. Crammed full with caffeine, you 'nana. And I know you drank it_ before_ you came in -' she grinned at him mischievously, eyes shining as she glanced at him with a new appreciation, 'Cause I tasted it on you.'

He stared at her in horror.

Then he swore.

And while McKay might not have spoken as many languages as her, it was still a startlingly educative experience.

She sat back and watched him, grinning cheerfully, and started to plan _exactly _what she would order from Earth...


End file.
